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Another Saturday morning on Rittenhouse Square for Regina, reading. She walked from 10th and Porter where her house was too empty to bear, not that it lacked furniture or fixtures. The walk was long and tiring and a park bench delivered the rest she needed.

So many places along the way reminded her of him, mostly restaurants: Francoluigi’s Pizzeria, Taqueria Veracruzana, Jamaican Jerk Hut. She wondered whether he’d think of her or another girl during the same walk, or perhaps he’d only think of himself.

Regina hears laughter and looks up from her book and observes a young couple walk past her bench, holding hands. They don’t speak to each other, the young couple, they just alternate between light laughter and the hearty kind. Regina thinks they might stop laughing, but whatever the cause of their mirth, it proves still too funny for anything but more laughter. The young couple laughs intermittently for the entire thirty seconds it takes them to pass Regina’s bench.

Now Regina’s melancholy yields to an appreciation for the beauty of the trees surrounding her, buildings on the square as their backdrop, a plot of green grass preserved for all time within her city. Most of the day lies ahead, she thinks.

On her walk home to 10th and Porter she takes the same route. Passing her favorite restaurants, this time she thinks only of her love for their food.